Always a tricky subject in terms of explaining why rental companies have the polices they have in place, namely the administration charge in place as a result of drivers been levied fines whilst in the hired vehicle, a fine could be levied as a result of:

* Breaking the local speed limit* Parking in a restricted area* Entering a one way street* Entering the congestion charging zone, London in the main part, but of course other countries of the world enforce their own congestion charging zones* Driving in bus lanes

Essentially when renting a car you agree that if you incur one of these such fines, you understand that the rental company will levy a admin charge, companies charge various degrees of admin charges, which essentially are there to pay for the administration costs, which we here at Indigo agree with to a certain degree, the process of administering the fine is as below.

The registered keeper of the vehicle is sent notification that a violation occurred in the vehicle, the admin clerk will then check to see whom was driving the vehicle at that given time and date and pull out the hire agreement which contains the customers signature, this document will then be sent to the driver of the vehicle with details of the fine and usually confirmation that the driver has been charged the admin fee – the admin fee takes care of the cost of performing the process I have just described, the admin fee typically stands at approx £35.00, but can vary from company to company, we can only leave it down to people to suggest whether they feel this admin fee is fair, quite frankly there is little we or anyone else can do about this, it is signed up to when taking receipt of the vehicle and is not exactly something that would be checked upon taking the vehicle out – after all no one expects to be caught speeding

What a lot of people fail to understand re the above is that the rental company will not actually pay the fine for you, to be fair it is not their job to and as per people rights it is not for the rental company to ‘admit your liability’ each individual has their own right to appeal, details surrounding this can be found on the document forwarded by the rental company or the local authorities document.

Obtaining tickets / penalties overseas can sometimes be problematic, as depending on what country the vehicle is rented and how efficient the local authority is and the local rental company depends on how quickly you get to know about the fine, been charged an admin fee 3 months after returning the car it not good practice, but non the less can and has happened. Please find below an extract from a case we recently dealt with where a customer was hit with 2 admin charges / fines 3 months after the vehicle was returned, this was in Italy.

Of course Indigo is here to advise people on how best to manage their car rental experience, but on this particular;r subject the best advice we can provide people is to be adhere to the rules of the road of the country you are renting the vehicle in, pay particular attention to parking restrictions and speed limits, bearing in mind these could be somewhat different to that of your home country.

Feel free to speak to anyone of our agents for friendly and impartial advice on this and any other car hire related subject

**Sorry for not replying, I am working very unsociable hours in Sicily at the moment **

What I mean is on the 2nd “Paperwork” I have only received one page and that did not have on it the speed I was going or what the limit was. Neither do I have any evidence such as photos.

I am also incredibly unhappy that twice Goldcar have taken 37 Euros (£30) from my account BEFORE emailing me any notification.

I would of thought management fines would be covered by the amazing top level insurance I purchased. Especially considering I said when purchasing that regardless of circumstance I wanted no further costs. I made this very clear. I appreciate if the fines are legitimate there is nothing I can do for them however the management fees should be reimbursed.

GoldCar have now replied but only with what I can call a “Crib sheet email” I will copy and paste now.

Dear customer,

Thank you for your observations about your car hire experience with us.Your opinion is important to us and is the key to our commitment to fulfil our customer’s expectations.After receiving your query regarding the charge to your credit card we would like to inform you that Goldcar has received notification of a traffic fine (1 or more than 1) that corresponds to your rental with us and we have submitted your data to the sanctioning body.You should have received notification from the traffic administration with all the details. Any questions or concerns you may should be directed to the administration responsible for said fine. Please take into account that Goldcar is not able to give any information corresponding to the fine amount or payment method.We would like to remind you that the fine management charges applied by Goldcar do not imply the partial or total payment of said fine and these charges are applied to all contracts where we receive an inquiry from the traffic authorities. We would also like to inform you that the fine payment cannot be made through Goldcar, you must follow the payment instructions that appear on the fine when your receive it.Unfortunately the high number of fines and sanctions committed by our customers during the last few years has obliged us to take this measure –also applied by many other companies in the sector–due to the high administrative costs incurred.This charge is reflected in point 10 of the terms and conditions of the contract you signed at the beginning of the rental. You can also see the rental terms and conditions at : http://www.goldcar.co.uk/tc/.We sincerely hope you understand our position and thank you again for your time and evaluation of our service, and we hope to have you back with us again in the near future.Remember that for future reservations please visit our website http://www.goldcar.es

Just had a customer call to query a charge of 54 AUD, spoke to Avis and confirmed the charge is an admin charge. This is a real bug bearer for people as an admin charge is not the actual fine. This is to be paid separately to the authorities that issued the fine. Car hire companies use the admin charge to fund the team of staff who deal with the fines on a daily basis. To be honest 54 AUD is a low amount, i have seen some suppliers charge upto 80.00 GBP for the exact same thing.

Green motion charge £85.00 which yes seems like a huge amount and is a huge amount, but in GM's defence the charge is made up of the below.....

It seems that Green motion lease their vehicles and therefore there is a further layer in the process, which essentially add to the admin cost.

In terms of advice to people I am not sure really as obviously when you rent a car you do not expect to incur a traffic violation, but if you do plan on doing so there are obviously certain companies whose vehicle you are better committing the offence in

******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************We respectfully ask you read this email through and refer to the link below before you contact us.

Unfortunately, we have recently been notified that during your rental period a Traffic Violation/Parking Offence has been committed. Please see the attachment for details.

As a reminder, your signature on the rental agreement provides Green Motion with authorisation to process any applicable charges for administration fees for violations incurred during your rental to your credit/debit card. Green Motion’s terms and conditions of hire state that:

‘I authorise the lessor to obtain payment of the Total Charge, calculated in accordance with the tariff rates agreed in this document, and any other sums due or which become due to the lessor, by debiting the card no. given, or the account referred to above.'

The Administration Charge structure is as follows:

Service charge made by Green Motion£30.00 plus VAT£36.00Service charge incurred by Green Motion on your behalf£40.00 plus VAT£48.00Total service charge to be applied£70.00 plus VAT£84.00

What happens next??We will write to the relevant authority telling them you were the driver and they will normally re-issue the notice directly to you. You will then be given the opportunity to pay the fine at the lower amount or to appeal against the notice.

We would not normally have paid your fine unless we have specifically told you that we have done so. Any fine remains outstanding and will be payable to the issuer on top of these charges.

If you have any other questions please refer to our FAQ document by clicking here.